Hackel blames computer breakdown on longtime lack of leadership'

County Executive Mark Hackel said Monday that a long-term “lack of leadership” led to the breakdown of the county’s computer system due to an electrical fire in the Macomb County Building last week.

Without a back-up system, the damage has crippled county government services as workers in nearly every department carry on with intermittent phone service at the same time that they resort to pen and paper to record all transactions.

“I think it was due to the lack of vision and lack of leadership with regard to IT and not having a director of that department,” Hackel said. “We know the potential was there for this kind of thing to happen and, guess what? It did.”

County government services could be back up to speed by the end of the week, with phone and computer operations restored after extensive water, smoke and soot damage to the old County Building, according to Hackel. Technical assistance from neighboring Oakland County will hopefully result in a temporary revival of Macomb’s information technology system.

But the County Building, located in downtown Mount Clemens, is expected to remain closed for months as officials contemplate the millions of dollars that will be needed to repair and upgrade the 69-year-old facility.

What’s more, Hackel said some of the temporary moves, with departments taking up quarters in other facilities, could become permanent and the county could lease portions of the 13-story County Building to private companies.

As for the reasons why a county with dozens of facilities and more than 2,000 employees did not have a computer back-up system, Hackel said the dysfunctional aspects of past county government, with 26 commissioners serving as the executive branch and a controversial IT director in charge of the computer system, led to last Wednesday’s disaster.

“It sometimes takes a crisis to get things moving,” the executive said. “This … was destined to happen.”

The Board of Commissioners had been warned for years that the county’s mainframe computer and the IT infrastructure located several floors below in the basement of the County Building were vulnerable because the facility had no modern fire-suppression or sprinkler system.

As recently as three weeks ago, the new IT director, Sandy Jurek, warned the board that the current IT process was unreliable and dangerous.

When the former IT director, Cindy Zerkowski, abruptly resigned in the summer of 2010, it took 2˝ years for the county to replace her.

By the end of this year, officials hope to relocate the IT Department and equipment to a new $14 million communications center at the Department of Roads building on Groesbeck Highway, along the outskirts of Mount Clemens. A backup system will be created at Macomb Community College. Bid requests for the purchase of computer servers at both locations will be sent out soon but Hackel said the county has no estimate of the cost.

The newest information indicates the County Building suffered “a tremendous amount of damage” to its electrical panels and wiring. Most troubling is the buckling of walls in one stairwell from the basement to approximately the fifth floor.

The county faces payment of a $100,000 deductible on its insurance coverage and possibly more, but the extent of short-term repairs is unknown.

Paychecks due this Friday to county employees will be distributed as usual.

The relocations of county departments due to the fire are as follows: Register of Deeds moved to the Clemens Center in downtown Mount Clemens; the Sheriff’s Department Civil Division went to the west lobby courthouse in the county jail; the Prosecutor’s Office attorneys who handle paternity and juvenile crime cases is now operating out of the Juvenile Court Building on Rose Street in Mount Clemens; purchasing, facilities and operations and the mail room shifted to a county warehouse in Clinton Township; and the IT Department is working in the Board of Commissioners offices at the Administration Building, also located in the downtown area.

The Finance and Human Resources Departments have been scattered to the Roads Department and the Emergency Management Center adjacent to the Juvenile Court building, but Hackel said they will likely be relocated a second time in the coming days to vacant, privately owned office space downtown.